Typesetting a document as large and complex as a doctoral dissertation is never going to be an easy task, but there’s no need to start from scratch. There are lots of templates freely available online to get you started.

Here are a range of templates from European and American universities. Although many have been produced by science departments, most of these templates are easily adapted for the purposes of humanities students.

**Note that not all of these are official university templates.**

Italian Thesis Template

An Italian template called toptesi is available through CTAN and can be modified for both undergraduate and graduate dissertations. Its multilanguage support makes it a good option for humanities students.

I particularly liked the template that Jeffrey Dwoskin put together to comply with the Princeton dissertation guidelines.

Check Your University’s Formatting Regulations

Once you’ve found a suitable template it’s really important to check what formatting specifications your university requires for the final version of the dissertation. Then you can adjust your generic template accordingly.

For example, the university regulations are likely to specify the page size, line spacing, font size, single- or double-sided printing, etc. They may also set out the requirements for the front matter of the dissertation, such as your name, dissertation title, degree for which it is submitted, a declaration of originality, etc.